What Is Employer Branding and Why Is It Important?

Seven out of ten employees need their employers to have a brand they feel proud of. 

And by employer brand, they don’t mean catchy slogans and flashy office spaces. 

No! That’s just the tip of the iceberg. 

The hidden mass is the bigger picture, encompassing employee experience and organizational satisfaction. It’s intangible and can only be experienced through the company’s deep-rooted values.

Let’s understand why employer branding makes so much sense today. 

What is Employer Branding?

James Ellis, an employer branding advocate, explains that employer branding is honesty about what it’s like to work at your company: the culture, the rewards, and the challenges. 

It’s being authentic about life at the company, telling true employee stories, and highlighting the company’s value proposition. It’s a demonstration of how you treat your employees. 

What’s the thing that compels your employees to work with you?

• Compensation and rewards? 
  • Compensation and rewards are important, and workplace wellness programs help keep top talent by looking after employees’ well-being. Companies should support individual health goals just like they support career goals. For instance, companies like HelloFresh offer customized meal options, making it easy for employees to enjoy a tasty, low-calorie dinner without much effort.
• Cool managers?
  • Effective leadership is essential. Managers who inspire and engage their teams create a positive work environment, fostering collaboration and innovation. For example, Google emphasizes leadership training to ensure managers can support and motivate their employees.
• Better flexibility and work-life balance than your competitors?
  • Flexibility and work-life balance are increasingly important. Offering remote work options and flexible hours can greatly enhance employee satisfaction and productivity. Salesforce, for example, has embraced a hybrid work model, allowing employees to more effectively balance their personal and professional lives.
• Or the way you handle employee grievances?
  • Handling grievances with transparency and fairness builds trust and loyalty. A strong grievance management system ensures employees feel heard and valued. Companies like Adobe prioritize open communication channels and a clear process for addressing concerns, fostering a supportive workplace culture.

The answers to these questions sum up the true meaning of employer branding.

Who Should be Involved in Employer Branding?

70% of workers want an organization’s leadership to discuss their company culture and values actively. Though it makes sense to let the face of the company — the founders and the CEO — take the reins in their hands, employer branding is not a one-person job.

For example, here’s how different stakeholders contribute to employer branding. 

1- Founders and CEOs

The leadership sets the foundation for employer branding. CEOs, founders, and C-suite executives:

• define the mission, vision, and core values of the company,
• create guiding principles for all other departments,
• Allocate resources for various training programs, employee wellness initiatives, and other perks to attract the right talent

2- HRs

HR managers are responsible for creating and implementing organizational policies that follow company values. 

• portray employer brand to potential candidates and employees of the company
• create hiring posts, job descriptions, internal communication emails, and career development programs
• send personalized emails to prospective candidates using email software like SendGrid highlighting the company culture, benefits, and career opportunities
• look after compensation and other employee benefits to translate the brand message into tangible offerings

3- Line Managers

They directly interact with employees, fostering a positive work environment that aligns with the company’s values. These managers:

• train employees, 
• look after their well-being, 
• help them get recognition for their work,
• share employee experience feedback with the upper management, guiding future branding strategies. 

4- Marketing Team

The marketing department communicates the employer brand to the external world via social media, company blogs, advertisements, career pages, PR, and other media. It is responsible for 

• crafting creative content assets to promote the company’s employer brand
• featuring employee stories and feedback in their messages to portray the employer brand and attract talent across the globe

Why An Employer Branding Strategy Is Important 

Employer branding is essential because it attracts quality talent and reduces cost-per-hire significantly. Here’s what the numbers say:

• Employer branding reduces employee turnover rates by 28%.
• A positive employer reputation brings in twice the number of applications as a negative reputation.
• 55% of job seekers refuse to work with brands having negative reviews. 

And how does employer branding influence job seekers?

1. It attracts the right talent to your company

Job seekers are now more aware of their rights and well-being regarding corporate culture. They research the company’s social pages and other media to learn how it treats its employees. 

Your positioning in the job market, messaging, and employee stories helps applicants form a clear perspective of their future at your company. 

2. It reduces the money spent on hiring people

With a strong employer brand, you don’t need to spend money advertising jobs on various platforms. The right talent will knock on your doors when they know how incredible it is to work with you.

Your reputation in the job market will be your “spokesperson,” telling people why you are better than your competitors.

3. It improves your employee retention rate

Employees value organizations with excellent reputations. They are reluctant to move on from workspaces that care about them and value their work. 

Employer branding makes people stay and support you throughout your journey. The best part is that those people encourage others to follow along.   

Holger Sindbaek, the owner of World of Card Games, said, 

“After taking over Word of Card Games in April 2023, we tackled our turnover challenge head-on with a refined employer branding strategy. We realized the secret to keeping our team together was deeply rooted in our employer branding. We shifted our focus to what genuinely motivates our staff: a shared passion for gaming and a culture that champions their contributions. This shift towards emphasizing shared values and recognizing individual contributions led to an incredible outcome: we witnessed a 25% increase in our team’s retention rate. Our strategy of aligning company culture with employee values not only fostered a sense of belonging but also positioned us as a prime destination for passionate professionals in the pet wellness space.”

4. It skyrockets employee engagement

Good employer branding ensures you attract like-minded individuals who share your company’s vision and mission. Their needs and expectations are more likely to align with your company’s employer value proposition (EVP).

When such employees start working with you, they become a highly engaged workforce. They then work together to achieve a common goal.

How to Establish Your Employer Brand 

Here are five steps to do employer branding correctly. 

1. Reflect on your business name

Job seekers are thoughtful about how you name your business. Your business name shouldn’t confuse people about who you are and what you do. 

For example, people who support environmental sustainability might pay more attention to brands with names like Wildflower, EcoJarz, or TerraCycle. These names depict the companies’ inclination towards the environment. 

So, if you want to give your business name a makeover, Wordlab’s Name Generators are your best shot. These name generators can help you pick the perfect name for your business, considering your industry, preferences, and company values in mind.

2. Craft a clear and realistic EVP

Employer value proposition (EVP) is your company’s representation of how it perceives and values talent. It reflects on your company’s deeper purpose and mission statement. 

Since an EVP makes employees feel their work will impact something big, you must craft it to invoke passion in candidates. They should feel proud to join you. 

For example, Patagonia’s EVP screams sustainability. 

“Build the best product, cause no unnecessary harm, use business to inspire and implement solutions to the environmental crisis.”

3. Maintain authenticity and transparency

Employees want companies to stay true to their written or spoken words and be transparent. They want you to be honest with them, whether compensation, rewards, benefits, or opportunities. 

If you take employee feedback, they want you to make changes and not discard negative reviews. 

Promising more than you can offer will backfire and harm your employer’s brand in the long run. Because people talk, spinning lies about your company’s employee experience can do more harm than good. 

Buffer, a social media management software, takes transparency to a new level. It shares its finances, salaries, and metrics to build trust and push the industry forward.

4. Use employee stories to spread the word about employee experience

What’s better than employee reviews and testimonials demonstrating your employer’s brand? Job seekers will trust employee stories more than any other form of communication from your side. 

Encourage your current employees to share their experiences with your company on websites like Glassdoor and Indeed. 

Another way is to share some of the best employee stories on social media platforms and your website’s career page. 

You could also do 1:1 interviews with your employees to understand their feelings about the company culture and overall employee experience.  

5. Focus on career development initiatives

Employees often get bored when they perform repetitive tasks every day. They seek new challenges and, hence, start looking for different opportunities. If you don’t want them to look for these opportunities outside your company, it’s your job to offer them a chance in your company.

That’s where training and development programs come in. These programs can help them prepare for a new challenge — a new role or technology — which, in turn, will help the company in other projects. 

Employee training initiatives are a crucial factor in employer branding. Candidates consider how actively the organization supports the growth and development of its employees. A good training initiative could be to make training videos for your employees. 

Cooley’s career development is exactly what employers seek to understand: a company’s dedication toward its employees’ growth. 

Top 3 Employer Branding Examples

Here’s some employer branding inspiration to help your creative juices flow!

1. Zappos’ “ZapposCulture”

Zappos’ culture is so creative and happening that it is offering consultations to other businesses to improve their cultures and leadership. 

The company narrates tales of employee experience via its Instagram account, @ZapposCulture, which showcases behind—the—scenes of events occurring in the company. Zappos’ culture revolves around employee engagement and happiness. 

2. Marriott International’s “Be You”

Marriott’s employer brand is all about diversity, inclusivity, and wellness. It uses various narrative tools, such as Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, and LinkedIn, to demonstrate its efforts. 

Marriott emphasized “Be you” across their employer branding messages, encouraging their existing and prospective employees to be themselves. 

3. Salesforce’s “Ohana”

Salesforce takes pride in its interpretation of its employees as family. Ohana family reunions — Ohana means family — bring employees together in a semi-formal gathering. This reflects a sense of community among the company’s employees. 

Salesforce events have driven its employer branding communication toward improved employee satisfaction and retention.  

Start Building Your Employer Brand Today!

By now, we’re sure you must be brewing some good ideas for your employer branding campaigns! 

Get your people together and think about how you would portray what the company stands for. 

If you want to bring in the right people to support you in your company’s mission and vision, employer branding is a must.